Non uniform at school - provocative clothing.

Non uniform day in my kids' primaries (and in the local secondary from what I see walking up and down to school) and most of the girls default to leggings and hoodies anyway! There's more of a faff during the school year with the secondaries constant flip flopping over what minuscule logo detail is suddenly prohibited on shoes than anything in non uniform day.

The ones where it's an issue are the nursery/reception girls, where it's come from parents obviously - who send the kids in in strappy sandals and frilly pretty dresses and loose flowing hair (which just makes me cringe with how inevitable the nits are) that are utterly impractical for early years learning. As soon as the kids get to dictate what they're wearing the clothing becomes much more geared to the important task of hanging upside down off the climbing frame for as long as you can competitions.

Obviously there should be no reference to subjective terms such as provocative. Instead it needs to state things like “clothing must not reveal navels, buttocks, breasts or genitalia”. Then deal separately with any other more detailed requirements eg thighs/shoulders as per school culture.

The easy answer is simply to redraft the wording in the policy, retain the references to the list clothing that is not permitted but remove references to girls so that it’s a blanket restriction. So no one is allowed to wear such items.

Men's clothes are merely functional, as men possess worth in their own right. Women have to work bloody hard to even be acknowledged, let alone valued, in society, and every tiny choice they make is scrutinised and criticised because they should know their place and not seek acknowledgement of any kind.

This is spot on

Remember the 80s? When fashion was long skirts, high-waisted baggy trousers, puffed sleeves, waistcoats and baggy jackets? Sure, skin was on show, but it wasn't all about displaying as much shape and skin as possible.

And I deliberately did not specify whose fashion, because in the 80s many of these styles were unisex.

Tbh the amount of school mums who come to pick up their dc in shorts with their bums hanging right out is more shocking to me ... yes good for them for being confident but it does not look flattering one bit.
And no I'm not jealous, I work out 6 days a week and work bloody hard and I think I look better naked now at 35 than I ever did before..but it doesnt mean I want everyone to see those bits of me ,nor is it cooler in hot weather, if anything it's more uncomfortable.
I do agree however that its what's been pushed on girls and women to think is fashionable. As soon as the suns outs everyone round here basically strips off and its stupid because looser flowy clothing would keep you cooler than a tight boob tube and denim shorts.
Anyway I realise I went off on a tangent there..insomnia makes me waffle sorry.

I guess the question should be why does fashionable = less fabric for girls?
You beat me to it OP.

I do feel girls are in a no win situation really because a lot of money has been spent over the years pushing a very narrow view of what it is to be an ideal woman, what beauty looks like and it just so happens that the dominant model of femininity and what girls should aspire to is thin, made up, tanned, no body hair, wearing fitted clothing or clothing that reveals a lot of skin that men typically want to look at.

Then when women pushed back, the advertisers and media rebranded to say 'do all the same stuff, but we'll rebrand it body confidence and you're doing it for you', which is the same end result but girls are taught they're doing all this additional styling and maintenance for them. It just so happens that it follows the same male gaze expectations.

At this point challenging the fact that a whole industry is created around subtly and not so subtle telling girls to appeal to men could be construed as being a prude. Or if people challenge the fact that teen girls often dress in accordance with the socialisation and advertising then they risk being told they're victim blamers or making girls responsible for men's actions.

There's a lot to unpick.

The school would be much better saying that all students are expected to wear appropriate length shorts/skirts, keep their chest and midriff covered. Naturally there's always going to be someone who shows up with their arse hanging out their shorts playing dumb asking what's inappropriate, but it's a starting point.

I wonder how a boy turning up wearing 'provocative' stereotypically female clothing might be treated?

I feel bad for teen girls. I remember the quandary of very short skirts being in fashion and it looking "wrong" if they were longer.

My feelings are:

1. bodies aren't shameful so if a girl is confident to go out in shorts with her bum hanging out good for her (looking at you SD) There's only a short window in life where you have that confidence

2. if boys/men can't deal with it, that's their problem and should be treated as such.

I think the root cause of this is porn culture and oversexualisation of girls, it's not fair to tell teen girls not to wear certain things when everything around them is telling them that's how they "should" look.

We need to deal with the underlying culture, then things will become more equitable. Although it appears that actually boys are becoming more image conscious, rather than women being less image conscious. Based on DS's instagram feed of waxed 6 packs and how to get them

I have to say though, I dress in a similar manner to your DD, though only jeans (no shorts). There is fuck all provocative about a cropped jumper and high waisted jeans. Nor about a high waist and a cropped T shirt.

It's absolutely not the point, but...

Once, having gone to church, I read in the newsletter a request for everyone to stop wearing short shorts in summer. What this was phrased as though, was 'please could congregants, male and female, stop wearing provocatively short clothing, especially shorts'.

Now, this was the first time I had EVER seen mens clothes described like this, so I asked about a bit. It turned out that the secretary was personally offended by the length of some of the mens football shorts and it was pretty much entirely directed at them .

But yeah, only once have I ever seen male and female dress requirements lumped together like that.

DD2's school always sends out guidance for non-school uniform day. It's very simple - "Whilst we want pupils to enjoy themselves, we need to considertheir comfort and health and safety. All tops must cover their midriff and not be too low or revealing. If shorts or skirts are worn, they must be of a decent length. No hot pants or extreme mini skirts. Shoes must be sensible and no high heels. No extreme hair colouring or excessive jewellery is allowed."

I think that's entirely sensible.

Well, TBH I think it is because the sexualisation of men's clothing is not a big thing. The fashion industry is not going out of it's way to make men present themselves as sex objects if they want to be cool or on-trend. So most boys and young men are not wearing things like that. You do at some schools see rules about tank tops, or sagging their jeans, and requiring shirts too.

In fact even men's shorts these days are pretty long.

Women's and girls fashion however consistently pushes the envelope of sexualising girls and telling them being in fashion means presenting themselves as sex objects. And because new things keep becoming normalised they keep having to find new ways to push that envelope, too.

So there are tons of women's clothes that do it, and girls who want to look cool and fit in want to or sometimes feel pressured to wear those things.

School dress codes usually reflect the things students actually try to wear. Being as it's a school, and it's not really appropriate for students to go around presenting as sex objects, or being surrounded by other people presenting as sex objects, so they often focus more on girls clothing.

The way around it is really for parents to talk to their daughters about the fashion industry and not needing to follow it's every whim.

BuzzFeed has a LOT of stories about Disney princesses and other characters.

I don't think the problem is with the rules as much as it is with a society where it's acceptable for sexualised clothes to be sold to teenage and younger girls. Some teenagers might find the rules helpful, though I like the way of framing them as what is allowed rather than what isn't.

I was reading a "here's what the Disney princesses would look like now" thing showing modern beauty standards on BuzzFeed (insomniac lately, don't judge me). Completely genuine article, not meant as a commentary on anything, just art.

The answer was essentially "more make up, fewer clothes, long straight hair".

Jellyslice
Neat idea.
My work involves a lot of rules, so, I generally try and focus information on what you can do, rather than what you can't. Your idea is beautifully simple.

I agree OP that there are two main issues -

(1) girls being held responsible for the boys' and teachers' inability to avoid sexually objectifying them, tale as old as time, and

(2) the fact that women's value to society is still unfortunately proportional to their attractiveness to men. Which influences fashion.

Men's clothes are merely functional, as men possess worth in their own right. Women have to work bloody hard to even be acknowledged, let alone valued, in society, and every tiny choice they make is scrutinised and criticised because they should know their place and not seek acknowledgement of any kind.

I teach science so having that much skin on show is a safety hazard

I know you probably meant having that much skin 'exposed' as opposed to 'on show' but this sounds like the risk is that boys might get distracted while carrying glass lab equipment.

Rather than saying no this garment, no that garment, no the other garment, naming specific garments for each sex, wouldn't it be more sensible simply to say something along the lines of "Skin may not be visible between knees and collarbones and between collarbones and upper arms"?

After all, it is considered inappropriate for either sex to expose these areas in formal daywear.

I've worked in schools with sixth form. Girls uniform are always an issue as everywhere I've been the code is that it should be knee length and the response to this includes comments like we're not nuns.

In sixth form boys usually stick to the suits rule and the biggest problems is top buttons undone or no tie and maybe shirts not tucked in.

Some sixth form girls would push more against business dress rules and wear low cut tops and so on. I'd email the sixth form team about this rather than speak to pupils directly as it is such an awkward conversation to have.

On a similar note there would be similar messages from the female head to staff briefings in the summer about wearing appropriate dress.

For men shirt tie and trousers are expected and adhered to. In hot weather men wear short sleeve shirts and may take blazers off.

For whatever reason there is less consensus about professional dress for women and more variation in what is worn in warmer weather